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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/30095106">Craigslist With Benefits</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Weevilo707/pseuds/Weevilo707'>Weevilo707</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Adventure Zone (Podcast)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Craigslist, F/M, Fluff and Humor, Friends With Benefits, Hijinks &amp; Shenanigans, Idiots in Love, Mutual Pining, and here we are, so there's a mbmbam bit, took that made it blupjeans, where the guy falls in love with the lady he met on craigslist</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-03-17</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-03-31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 11:21:16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>9,475</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/30095106</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Weevilo707/pseuds/Weevilo707</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>"Kravitz, I need your advice but you need to promise not to be weird about it."</p>
<p>"Barry I had to pull you out of a fridge last week, nothing you say will surprise me at this point."</p>
<p>"If you say so, fine. So you see, I was on Craigslist a few weeks ago and I answered this ad from a woman looking for uh, a virgin guy? To well, the ad said 'deflower'"</p>
<p>"Oh my gods how do you still have your head? Barry she was literally looking for a virgin sacrifice, you should be tied to an alter with your heart cut out!"</p>
<p>"Be quiet its hard putting myself out there. Anyway I've met up with her a few times since then and uh, I think I might actually be in love with her? What- what do I do?"</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Barry Bluejeans/Lup, Kravitz/Taako (The Adventure Zone)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>82</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>290</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. You Are Only Permitted The One Life</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Barry Bluejeans was on a very simple mission really. He was going to perform necromancy on his computer.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But first, he needed to kill it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Or in the words he would have used if he wanted people to actually understand what he was talking about, he was going to riddle his computer with as many viruses and malware as possible until the thing was nigh unusable. Then he was going to see how well his new protection software managed to bring it back to life.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He’d already been through a few illegal cartoon streaming sites, clicking on all the fake play buttons and accepting all the great new deals. He had apparently won a </span>
  <em>
    <span>lot</span>
  </em>
  <span> of free ipods, lucky him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His computer was starting to chug, but before it got too messed up he wanted to get some more unique viruses in. Some of that custom shit people handcrafted to be as annoying and stubborn as possible.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He wasn’t sure how lucky he would be in that regard with his current search, but the weird side of Craigslist was looking promising. Skimming the listings, he found one that definitely looked like a neon sign to lure in horny idiots.</span>
</p><p>
  <b>Bored Elf Woman Looking For Virgin Man To Deflower ;)</b>
</p><p>
  <span>Barry snorted, clicking on the link and reading the listing. It didn’t take him long, the thing almost comically short.</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Exactly what it says on the tin hot stuff.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>There was a fucking AOL instant messenger contact and nothing else other then the usual ‘Do not Contact for Unsolicited Services’ at the bottom. Quickly downloading the instant messenger, which honestly probably gave his computer another virus or two just by that, he put in the username.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He had been kind of stumped on what to put for his username, since he could not remember his actual old AOL account from five hundred years ago. He eventually ended up just going with BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans. Figuring that was good enough for a bot, he started typing up a message.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans:</span>
  <em>
    <span> good evening Ms Beaut, I’m not sure if this counts as an unsolicited service, but I’m just here for the spam emails and viruses.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>I won’t give you my credit card info but if you need an email that’s fine. I’ve got a few burners set up for this.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Three small dots bounced around the bottom of the screen, going longer than Barry expected. Usually bots were pretty fast with the automated response.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>sorry to disappoint you babe, no viruses here.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>if you’re looking for spam I could forward you some of the stuff going to my junk box i guess? but otherwise you’re out of luck</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Barry paused at that, because it wasn’t the answer he was expecting. He was barely expecting an answer, not one that made sense at least. Just some pre programmed messages attempting to sound believable enough to convince someone to give over their information. That wasn’t this.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>oh shit you’re a real person</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>I'm so sorry, I thought this was a bot someone set up</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>Hey don’t sweat it, nicest messages I’ve gotten all day</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>I gotta ask though, because you’ve piqued my curiosity and it will never be satisfied until I know. why’re you apparently trying to get spam and shit?</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>I’m trying to kill my computer</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>There are easier ways. You could punch it, if it's a laptop it’ll only take one punch. That’s what happened to my brother’s laptop. according to all accounts though it definitely happened falling down the stairs and not because someone was mad at losing chess against the computer again</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Barry hadn’t realized he’d started smiling as he typed to this woman. He had not been expecting to have a conversation with another living person until at least morning. His roommate had already left for his night shift, which meant normally he wouldn’t see anyone until he went to work.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Despite being woefully unprepared for any kind of social interactions, the conversation felt surprisingly easy. Probably because it was through text, Barry had always been better at putting his thoughts into the written word. The AOL messenger was probably kicking up some nostalgia or something too.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>true, but I’m working on an antivirus program. It’s a damn good program, but I don’t think it’ll do much against punches</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiedBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>pretty big oversight there babe, gonna have to get on that before you put out the final product</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>I’ll be sure to do that :P</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>fuck, I can’t remember the last time I used a goddamn emoji. I can’t believe five minutes on AIM and I’m already back in middle school</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>oh I know right? I feel like I’ve been encased in amber</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>I’m sorry, I keep reading your username like a bootleg version of beetlejuice. I feel like I’m gonna turn around to find some denim demon looming over me</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Barry couldn’t keep from laughing loudly at that, glad no one was around to hear him snort. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>Damn, you figured me out. And here I thought I might be able to finally escape this digital prison</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>well, if it’s an escape you’re looking for I might be able to help with that ;)</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>As he read the most recent message Barry could feel his face start to burn. Right, impossibly he had somehow managed to forget about the actual listing he’d been responding to. He should finish up this conversation and get back to slowly murdering his computer.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>Right, so that listing is actually real huh?</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>Depends</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Ending the conversation any minute now.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>On?</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>On a lot of things. I’ve got some pretty high standards</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>Makes sense, I can’t imagine that any of the other responses you’ve gotten have been all that pleasant</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>nope, you weren’t even trying and you’re definitely at the top of the list already bluejeans</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Oh god it wasn't ending.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His face was definitely on fire, and Barry didn’t know why he wasn’t ending this. Surely it had to be a joke or something. It was hard to tell if this woman was just that casual or that good at fucking with people though. There was no doubt that if he didn’t get out of this soon he was going to make a complete fool of himself.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>well uh</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>there weren’t, ya know</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>a *lot* of details in your listing</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>but I do fit the ones given</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>oh</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>The silence that stretched on made Barry want to die. Each moment that went by left him bemoaning the fact that no one had leapt through his window to kill him yet. Someone should have been able to sense he was being a dumbass and took him out already. Every so often those three typing dots would show up, only to quickly disappear again a moment later.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>Shit, I’m sorry. I made this weird</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>it was already weird babe don’t gotta apologize for that</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>was just surprised is all. You don’t seem the type to take up this kinda offer</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>I mean, you’re not wrong about that. I’m super not</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>but uh, what is it the kids are always saying? You Are Only Permitted The One Life? YAOPTOL?</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>aslkfjdf</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>no, that’s definitely not it</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>dork :P</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>okay though, I am gonna need to see some proof that you aren’t 80 with that one before we go any further grandpa</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>does aim have video chat yet?</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Barry froze at that, the reality of the situation starting to come back at him again. The part of his brain that was practical and held all the common sense and good life decision abilities was telling him that he needed to cut this off now. Nothing good would come from meeting up with a stranger who was propositioning him. Or was he propositioning her? He genuinely couldn’t tell anymore.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Unfortunately for everyone that cared about him, Barry was rarely good at listening to that part of his brain.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>Oh fuck yeah, nothing is anything until all ages are confirmed</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>I can’t find one? Honestly I’m surprised the chat function is still working</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>yeah, I didn’t think so</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>would you be cool using a real chat service? Like, it don’t gotta be your goddamn work zoom but ya know, if we’re doing this</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>BluejeansBluejeansBluejeans: </span>
  <em>
    <span>yeah no that’s all fine by me. Uh, do you have a skype?</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>FlameBroiledBeaut696969: </span>
  <em>
    <span>for sure</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Barry really didn’t know what the fuck he was doing, but soon enough she had sent him over a skype name, and he had sent his. Lupdeloop, which was kind of adorable. While the program took fucking five hundred years to load (he had started to forget about all the viruses he’d already started loading up to his computer) he made sure there wasn’t too much trash or anything else that would make him look like more of a creep that he probably already was being.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Honestly, he was pretty damn sure the only reason he’d managed to get himself this far was because he highly doubted she would actually agree to anything once she saw him. Barry was well aware he didn’t typically check off a lot of the list for people who had high standards.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>As his computer finally fought through its multiple illnesses and connected to the video chat Barry realized that he had been so concerned with what he looked like, he hadn’t thought to wonder what she looked like.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Which, oh.</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Wow</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The good news was that everything seemed to be above board and honest when it came to age. It was hard to tell with elves sometimes, but it was clear that they were at about equal footing on the age department. Barry wasn’t sure if he’d call the rest bad news, but it was certainly news. It was frankly unfair just how </span>
  <em>
    <span>gorgeous</span>
  </em>
  <span> she was. He’d been trying so hard not to look like a creep but there were a few seconds where all he could do was stare at her. Even in the terrible video quality she looked like she might as well be glowing.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Oh, she was turning him down for </span>
  <em>
    <span>sure.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“So, I’m gonna take a wild swing and guess that bluejeans are kinda your </span>
  <em>
    <span>thing,”</span>
  </em>
  <span> she said, and it took him a moment to realize what she meant. Right, his skype name.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It started as a joke but then it wouldn’t stop and now all the mail that comes to my house is addressed to Barry Bluejeans,” he admitted, and she laughed at that. Somehow it managed to make her even prettier, her face scrunching up and long elf ears tilting back.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’re joking,” she said, and Barry shook his head.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“If we ever meet up I will show you my drivers license,” he said, and the grin she gave him at that could have stopped his heart.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh, we are </span>
  <em>
    <span>definitely</span>
  </em>
  <span> meeting up,” she said. Barry couldn’t hide the surprise on his face at that, his eyebrows raising up quickly.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Really?” he asked. She nodded, that smile that looked like it could eat him alive dipping into something a little less threatening.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“For sure, I mean, unless you changed your mind. You’re cool to change your mind at any point babe,” she said, and Barry quickly shook his head at that. He did not see that actually being a problem.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No, no, I just uh, kinda figured you would? I’m, ya know, just kinda Barry. I’m not exactly a hot dude,” he said, holding his arms out and letting them fall back to his sides with a flop. Instead of agreeing that yeah, he was average in every way a person could be on a good day, she was frowning now.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What? No, you look so soft,” she insisted, and Barry could feel his face heating up at the downright wistful tone to her voice. “Oh right, I didn’t actually give you a name yet. It’s Lup,” she added quickly, and even with his face burning he couldn’t help smiling at that.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s really nice to meet you Lup,” he said, maybe a little surprised at how much he meant that. It was true though, even if this was by far one of the weirdest situation he’d ever gotten himself into.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Right back at you Barry,” she said, an earnest tone to her voice. Then the easy smile on her lips shifted into the one that gave him the distinct feeling that she could destroy him if she wanted to.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“So, when do you think you might be available?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well, considering my only plans for tonight was giving my computer a slow and painful death… now?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It </span>
  <em>
    <span>felt</span>
  </em>
  <span> like everything between then and now had passed in a big blur, but Barry knew that it hadn’t. They had talked, they had talked for a </span>
  <em>
    <span>while,</span>
  </em>
  <span> about quite a few very important things. Before even getting off the chat or giving any more possibly identifying information Lup had needed to make sure Barry was cool with her identity. Which, yeah, that certainly wasn’t going to be a problem.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He hadn’t realized the tension in her shoulders until he had come back from jumping up to grab the little bi pride flag that had been sitting in a jar with some pens and such behind his computer. It was barely noticeable, but as he watched it slowly ebbed away, something just that much more relaxed about her after that. It was nice.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They had talked about  other things too, what they were both comfortable with, especially him. Barry was pretty sure the only thing keeping him from imploding with embarrassment was how surreal the whole thing was. None of it felt quite real.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And this, right now, this definitely didn’t feel real. Conceptually Barry could remember all of the steps that had gotten him to this position, but it still didn’t seem to add up. There was absolutely no reason for him to be on his back, having been knocked onto the bed in a shitty inn, literally the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen in his life above him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He thought she’d been gorgeous over video chat. That connection should be ashamed of itself, of all the features it had decided to dull. He hadn’t even been able to </span>
  <em>
    <span>tell</span>
  </em>
  <span> she had freckles, shining across her skin like flecks of gold dust.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There were hands under his shirt, running up his sides for a moment before starting to tug at the fabric. Reluctantly he pulled back from the kiss, sitting up the slightest bit to help Lup remove his shirt. He didn’t see where it was tossed off to, and frankly he couldn’t give less of a shit.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Instead of going back to his mouth, Lup started kissing and nipping at his neck.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Do you have… any idea how </span>
  <em>
    <span>disappointed</span>
  </em>
  <span> I would have been… if after all that you showed up in like, slacks?” she asked in between kisses, one of her hands coming to rest at the top of the jeans he was still wearing.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’ve learned to embrace it,” he said, letting his own hands wander over her form, one of them eventually making its way under her shirt. He didn’t get very far before Lup was pulling away from him, and he tried not to show his disappointment at that.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>That didn’t last for long, Lup quickly shucking her own shirt off before leaping back onto him, capturing his mouth in a hungry kiss. He immediately began kissing back, pressing his thigh up between her legs. He could </span>
  <em>
    <span>feel</span>
  </em>
  <span> her moan into his mouth, the sensation turning his whole body to jelly.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Intellectually, Barry knew the reality of the situation. He knew that he was in a shitty motel room, that he had not told anyone where he was going, and that he was with a stranger he met a mere few hours ago on a sketchiest part of craigslist he could find.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>If she wanted to kill him, the only person anyone could blame in this situation was him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lup moaned into his mouth again, and yeah, Barry didn’t give a shit about dying.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>You are only permitted the one life, and all that.</span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>so i got this idea the other night when i couldn't sleep at all and was listening to some older mbmbam bits. It would not leave my brain until i turned it into a full fic, so here we are. i have no regrets and neither does barry or lup </p><p>as always thanks for reading and i hope you enjoyed!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Busy. Also, Naked.</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Despite all evidence to the contrary, this wasn’t actually how Lup was planning or expecting her night to go. She certainly didn’t put up that fucking craigslist ad with any intention of even interacting with anyone, let alone meeting up with them.</p>
<p>It had been somewhere in that sweet spot between a joke only she thought was hilarious and a social experiment. The first part was just seeing how many fucking idiots either went to <em> craigslist </em> to get their rocks off instead of ya know, one of the many apps or other services actually designed for this. Alternatively, how many people were on craigslist for perfectly legitimate reasons but then saw that disaster of a listing and decided yes, this was definitely their lucky day. That was the whole social experiment aspect.</p>
<p>The fucking hilarious aspect was that the goddamn aim messaging system was so old and defunct that it hadn’t been hard at all for her to essentially break it open and put in a couple of fun automatic responses. It wouldn’t say anything if they just tried to talk like a normal person and not a complete monster. If they tried to send a picture or any particular keywords she programmed in though, it would delete their message before she could see it and automatically respond with one of over a dozen images she’d chosen.</p>
<p>Some of her favorite options were a pizza shaped like Garfield the cat, a dog with big meaty human hands, and pickle rick.</p>
<p>She’d barely been paying attention when <em> his </em> message had come in, but she honestly hadn’t been getting as many responses as she expected. One point in favor of humanoids, she supposed.</p>
<p>So when she glanced over expecting to read another skeevy response, she was really fucking thrown by the actual message there. The fact that it had managed to get through at all meant it was already better than any of the dick pics or sleezy messages that automatically triggered her punishment bot. Her curiosity was always going to be her downfall, and the message asking for spam mail and viruses while politely declining to give her their credit card info was too bizarre for her <em> not </em> to response.</p>
<p>And maybe things had spiraled from there a little bit. Maybe she had started off still trying to see how much she could mess with this dude, but in a more friendly way. Just throwing some things out there and waiting to see how this guy reacted to decide whether or not it was going to be a joke.</p>
<p>Barry hadn’t been able to tell she was joking, so she very quickly stopped joking.</p>
<p>And now that she was laying in the cheap little no-tell motel they could find, Lup was waiting for the regret to start to set in.</p>
<p>Maybe the weirdest part about this night so far was that it <em> wasn’t </em>.</p>
<p>“So,” Lup said, because even though there was a distinct lack of regret from these decisions there was only so long she could lay in silence before she started feeling antsy. It did help some that Barry didn’t seem to have any complaints about her laying half on top of him. Dude could definitely relax more, but he didn't try to pull away, even as she shifted so that she could fold her arms up under her chin and rest her head there. She had been absolutely right. He <em> was </em> soft.</p>
<p>“So?” he asked back, and Lup appreciated that Barry’s flustered awkwardness let her seem real damn smooth in comparison. Like, she was, but even she could admit this was pretty fucking far from her normal scene.</p>
<p>“How you doing? All good?” she asked. Barry quickly nodded as much as he could while still lying down. Lup felt a little bad for him being the one stuck on the shitty bed while she got a comfortable cushion. Not bad enough to switch though.</p>
<p>“Oh, oh yeah! I’m good, more than good,<em> great,” </em> he said, and Lup’s grin slowly widened as his face got steadily darker and darker red. It didn’t take long before he was throwing one of his arms up over his eyes. “I’m sorry, this is just- you can kill me now if you want,” he muttered, and Lup snorted at that.</p>
<p>“Nah, you’re more fun like this,” she said, very tempted to stretch forward and kiss him again. She resisted though, and after a moment Barry lifted his arm up enough to peek out at her.</p>
<p>“Your kindness is a curse, this is the real torture,” he said dryly. Lup kept on grinning at him, and it seemed to be enough to get him to relax again some. When he pulled his arm down instead of laying it back at his side Lup felt it wrap lightly across the small of her back. She could see the question in his face before he even spoke. “Is- uh, is this okay? I get it if you need to head out soon, or anything,” he offered.</p>
<p>There was a moment where Lup considered taking the out. After all, it wasn’t like this was the first time she’d hooked up with someone before, although those had been under decidedly less bizarre circumstances. Still, more often than not she preferred to bounce pretty quick when it came to one night stands.</p>
<p>Except she was comfy, and there was still something so surreal about all of this that she didn’t want it to end yet.</p>
<p>Plus, if she stuck around until morning she could probably convince Barry to go another round.</p>
<p>“Nah, I’m good right here. Besides, we paid for the room for the night. Might as well not let it go to waste,” she said, letting herself get real comfortable. She felt Barry tense up under her, but after a second or so he seemed to relax, the arm along her back tightening slightly.</p>
<p>“You got a point there,” he said, an almost amused tone to his voice. She could feel him reaching around for something, but before she could ask what was up she felt him pull one of the blankets that had gotten tossed aside over them.</p>
<p>It was nice. Lup genuinely couldn’t believe how <em> nice </em> this guy was, especially considering they had met in the most buckwild way imaginable. She almost regretted that they met like that, since she doubted it would go anywhere. That he was actually interested in anything real coming out of this, but it was fine because she told herself she wasn't either. Still, she wasn’t going to think about any of that right now. Lup closed her eyes, telling herself she was going to enjoy this and go to seep and pretend this whole thing wasn’t the actual craziest fucking thing she’d ever done.</p>
<p>She almost managed it, before a very incessant buzzing broke up the serenity of the situation.</p>
<p>“Uuugh,” she groaned, Barry patting around the bed in a fruitless attempt at finding a phone.</p>
<p>“I uh, I don’t think it’s mine? My roommate’s working nights tonight, he shouldn’t call unless there was an emergency,” he said, which made sense. Huffing and not actually moving all that fast Lup forced herself to sit up. There was definitely something amusing to the dark shade of red that covered Barry’s face as the blanket fell away from her, the dude averting his gaze as if he hadn’t been all over this like half an hour ago. Also something very cute about it.</p>
<p>It managed to lift her spirits a little bit as she searched through the discarded clothes until she found her pants and the phone buzzing away inside. Looking at the screen she let out a groan at the name she knew she’d see.</p>
<p><em> Maybe </em> she should have mentioned to her brother that she was heading out at 11:42pm, but she did not want to explain <em> why </em> to the nosy dweeb.</p>
<p>“Ko, I’m busy. Also, naked,” she said, because it wasn’t going to stop until she answered. The noise of disgust her brother made was pretty damn funny at least.</p>
<p>“<em>Why? </em> Why would you feel the need to <em> tell me </em> that? Now I have to block out even more memories,” he whined, and Lup rolled her eyes.</p>
<p>“Would you rather I not tell you? Leave you in a constant state of wondering if I’m nuding it up every time we talk on the phone?” she asked.</p>
<p>“It would not have crossed my mind to consider ever it before you brought up the possibility, so yes,” he insisted. Barry seemed to have gotten over his sheepishness at this point, watching her have this conversation with obvious amused befuddlement.</p>
<p>“Too late. What do you want?” she asked, getting an indignant huff in return.</p>
<p>“Well, I <em> was </em> wondering where my dear sister had disappeared off to in the middle of the night without so much as a note, but now I’m thinking maybe I don’t want to know,” he said.</p>
<p>“Yeah, we’re not discussing this,” she said, because there was absolutely no reason to discuss any of her hookups with her brother. Well, maybe when they were hilariously bad or something like that, but Barry was nice. She didn’t want to subject him to her brother’s torment.</p>
<p>“Please let’s not. I just needed to make sure you were safe and that stupid craigslist post didn’t blow up and make some skeezeball run off with you,” Taako said, some relief in his voice. It was fair that he’d been worried, and that <em> wasn’t </em> what happened.</p>
<p>Lup couldn’t help but hesitate slightly at the mention of that damn post though. Taako knew her too well, he knew what silences were normal and which were hiding something, and this one was definitely the latter.</p>
<p>“Wait. Lup, you’re <em> not </em> with some fuckface from craigslist, right?” he asked, sudden suspicion coating his every word.</p>
<p>“<em>Okay gotta run, later bro,” </em> she said, speaking too quickly. Maybe there could have been a way to play it off, but that sure as hell wasn’t it.</p>
<p>“Lup! Lup don’t you fucking dare hang u-” her brother was shouting, but she did just that and hung up. She put her phone on airplane mode for good measure before tossing the thing back into the pile of clothes again.</p>
<p>When she turned back towards Barry, he looked like he was trying not to laugh.</p>
<p>“So uh, who was that?” he asked, and even with how flustered she felt Lup had to admit she appreciated how chivalrous Barry was being. Even with all of her on display he didn’t seem to have a problem keeping his eyes on her face.</p>
<p>“Just my dumb brother,” she grumbled, moving back towards the bed, this time actually catching the lights on the way, sending the room into darkness. As soon as she was close enough Barry lifted his arm up, giving her access to back under the covers again. She quickly took up the offer, crawling on top of him before flopping down with a sigh. Barry’s arms wrapped around her again, and there was a part of her that could get used to this.</p>
<p>“I’m gonna go to sleep now. Any other talky-talky that needs happening can wait until morning,” she said. She could feel Barry chuckle underneath her at that, which was much nicer than it had any right to be.</p>
<p>“Sounds like a plan,” he said, but before he could even finish Lup started shushing him.</p>
<p>“Shhhh, sleepy times,” she insisted, pressing a finger roughly up to his mouth. She could feel him smiling before turning his head slightly, very gently pressing a kiss to her fingers.</p>
<p>Which oh-</p>
<p>Oh that sure did <em> something </em> to her heart.</p>
<p>Burrowing her head into his chest so that he couldn’t see her face heat up, she supposed it wasn’t really necessary. It was dark and he was human.</p>
<p>Still, it felt like it helped. At the very least, probably helped to hide how long it actually took her to fall asleep.</p>
<p>She did end up sleeping though, honestly a better rest than it had any right to be. Good enough that she was extremely disgruntled when a loud alarm started going off. Instead of reaching to turn it off she whined, clinging tighter to the warm soft body she was on top of. There were a few seconds where that was kind of confusing, but then the weirdness of last night came back as that damn <em> ringing </em> wouldn’t stop.</p>
<p>“Make it stoooop,” she groaned, slapping fruitlessly at what was either Barry’s shoulder or his cheek.</p>
<p>“What?” he grumbled, sounding even more asleep than she did. It seemed to be enough to get his brain to jump start after a moment though. “Oh shit!” he said, and Lup could feel him tense up below her. There was a second where it seemed like he was going to sit up, before realizing that she was still laying on top of him. “Uh, Lup? I need to get up.”</p>
<p>“Nooo,” she whined, squeezing him tighter. She regretted it almost immediately, because this was just a hook up. They weren’t dating, they couldn’t even rightfully be considered friends yet. Acting clingy like this was not really acceptable behavior. She was usually pretty good about following the broadly established social conventions in this regard too.</p>
<p>There was just something about Barry that made her relax. She should probably get a handle on that.</p>
<p>Luckily for her, he didn’t seem annoyed by the gesture, at least not outwardly. She could feel him laugh against her, still laying there pliantly despite his alarm continuing to go off.</p>
<p>“I can’t make it stop unless I get up,” he argued instead. Lup let out a long, defeated sigh before slumping off of Barry. As much as she would have liked to keep lying there she’d already pushed more than she should have. Plus, if she had to guess that alarm was probably <em> for </em> something.</p>
<p>From the look on his face when he finally managed to fish his phone out of his discarded pants pocket, probably something important.</p>
<p>“Shit, I uh, I need to get going. It’s- ya know, work,” he said, and Lup at least let herself pout at that. He was holding his jeans in front of him in an attempt at modesty, but that was fair since she was still mostly wrapped up in blankets. Plus, he just seemed like a modest guy.</p>
<p>“Aw, we slept too late. I was hoping to get another round in before you had to leave,” she said, and the way Barry’s eyebrows raised up at that was both hilarious and adorable.</p>
<p>“<em>Oh?” </em> he squeaked out. Lup couldn’t help but smirk as he glanced at the time on his phone again. “I mean, we might be able to- if uh, if I just head out straight from here instead of going home… didn't bring a change of clothes though. It wouldn't be the <em> first </em> time I wore jeans to work though,” he contemplated, and Lup snorted at that.</p>
<p>“Nah, as tempting as that is, trust me, we should be responsible and all that,” she said, more reluctant than she let on.</p>
<p>“Right, that would be smart,” he said, not quite able to hide his disappointment as well as she could. He started getting dressed then, and for a moment Lup sat there, continuing to watch him. Maybe it was weird, but everything about this had been weird so far. She had expected, or at least hoped, that by the time morning came she would be done and able to part ways amiably.</p>
<p>But it was morning now, and she still didn’t want this to end yet.</p>
<p>“Hey, gimme your phone for a minute?” she said, and by now Barry had his pants on and was looking around trying to find his shirt.</p>
<p>“Huh? Okay,” he said, tossing it over to her. She caught it, quickly opening it up to his contacts.</p>
<p>“You said your roommate was working nights, right? He do that often?” she asked, typing her information into a new contact, sending herself a text to get his number as well.</p>
<p>“Oh yeah, not in any sort of predictable schedule, but enough. Dude has an even worse sleep schedule than me,” he said. Lup held out the phone for him to take again. He had his shirt in his hands now, but hadn’t put it on yet.</p>
<p>“Cool, maybe next time we could head to your place instead of a motel of questionable repute,” she said, winking as he reached for the phone. Barry froze at that, clearly surprised and Lup couldn’t say she was a fan of the anxiety starting to pool in her guts. It felt like they might have been on the same page, but she couldn't be certain.</p>
<p>“Next time?” he asked, and Lup nodded, shrugging as casually as she could manage.</p>
<p>“Yeah, I mean, if you’re interested. I just figured why not, ya know? This was fun,” she said, and Barry very quickly nodded. It was mighty annoying that Lup could breathe a little bit easier at that.</p>
<p>“Oh, oh yeah no, definitely,” he said, and Lup grinned at that. He had yet to actually take the phone out of her hand, seeming to have forgotten about it and leaving his hand laying on top of it.</p>
<p>“Excellent,” she said, grabbing his wrist and pulling him forward into a kiss. He went along easily, the shitty bed creaking loudly as he put a hand down to keep himself from toppling over onto her. Not that she would have minded all that much, if she were being honest. Still, just this was good. This slow kiss, still lazy from waking up.</p>
<p>Much sooner than she would have liked though Lup was pulling away. It was hard not to laugh at the dazed look on Barry’s face, but she managed with a somewhat cocky smirk as she raised an eyebrow instead.</p>
<p>“Work?” she reminded, and that seemed to get him moving again. He nodded quickly, coughing as he took his phone from her finally.</p>
<p>“Right, that’s- right,” he said, throwing his shirt back on. At this point Lup had started rooting around for her own clothes. Barry must’ve noticed, tossing her a pile that had gotten shoved under more blankets. As she got dressed, quietly thanking her lucky stars that she <em> did </em> have off work today, there was still this annoying nagging in the pit of her stomach.</p>
<p>She didn’t want to leave it like this, which made no sense because this had gone <em> great. </em> She’d even made plans to meet up again, what else was there?</p>
<p>“Well uh, I should probably get going now, before I’m late. But this was- this was fun? Geeze, sorry that sounded lame,” Barry said, which, right, of course. Barry had been pretty upfront about this being his first rodeo, and Lup liked this nerd. She didn’t want to fuck up and hurt him.</p>
<p>Which meant communication.</p>
<p>“No man, you’re right, it was fun,” she said, her expression turning a bit more serious. She was glad that she had thrown her clothes back on before starting the actual emotions part of this talk. “I’ll be honest, I haven’t had this much fun with someone in a long time, and obviously I’d like to keep it up if you’re down,” she added.</p>
<p>“Of course,” Barry said, and it certainly seemed like he was being genuine. Still, she needed to be clear about this. She wasn’t going to be an asshole.</p>
<p>“I mean like, <em> just </em> for fun though. Like, why ruin this by making it complicated, ya know?” she said, and Barry seemed to get the picture, a look of understanding on his face as he nodded.</p>
<p>“Right, no that’s fine by me,” he said, and Lup smiled at that. The pit in her stomach didn’t feel lighter exactly, but it was definitely <em> different </em> so that would have to do for now.</p>
<p>Another alarm started going off then, and Barry flinched as he quickly turned it off.</p>
<p>“Shit, okay that’s my late bell. I really gotta run, but talk later?” he asked, and Lup grinned as he nodded.</p>
<p>“Definitely, for sure,” he said. Giving her a dopey smile Barry headed out of the inn. Lup didn’t wait around long, this place really wasn’t the best. Instead she gave Barry just enough of a head start that if they were going in the same direction for a while it wouldn’t be awkward.</p>
<p>When she reached her apartment, it sounded quiet. There were a few long moments where she simply stood there, wondering if maybe she was lucky and Taako had gone out for the day already. He was not going to be happy after she hung up on him, after she basically admitted to running off to hook up with some rando who’d answered her sketchy craiglist joke ad.</p>
<p>(It hadn’t been like <em> that </em> though, it was more complicated. Barry was sweet).</p>
<p>Taking a deep breath, she opened the door. Peaking inside, it was dark, and Lup let out a sigh of relief as she stepped inside. Taako must’ve been angry enough to just straight up leave, she was lucky.</p>
<p>Flipping the lights on, Lup yelped when Taako’s bedroom door was kicked open with a loud bang.</p>
<p>“I cannot believe you!” Taako shouted. Lup groaned, slumping up against the door behind her.</p>
<p>“Can we not? Can we please just not?” she tried, but it was clear that he wasn’t having any of this.</p>
<p>“I can’t believe we share genetic material, you make me so angry!”</p>
<p>“No, nope we’re not doing this. I’m taking a shower first,” she said, because she had not trusted that motel shower for more than the quickest of rinses. Ignoring Taako’s protests, she headed straight to the bathroom. She wasn’t paying attention to anything else, barely bothering to grab a towel and change of clothes on the way.</p>
<p>She had been so single minded, that she nearly fell on her ass when she swiped the shower curtain out of the way, jumping back and cursing in surprise.</p>
<p>“Fucking <em> clown </em> in the <em> shower?!” </em></p>
<p>
  <em> “Yes! Because you wanna act like a fool! Now you get the clown balloon!” </em>
</p>
<p>Groaning, Lup grabbed the clown balloon by the neck, tossing it out of the bathroom before stepping into the shower. It wasn’t like she couldn’t understand why Taako was upset. If the positions were reversed she would be angry and freaked out at her brother doing something that seemed so blatantly full of bad decisions.</p>
<p>She wasn’t looking forward to trying to explain to him that no, the guy who responded to her deliberately sketchy craigslist sex ad was actually really sweet.</p>
<p>She was even less excited to explain that she had every intention of meeting up with him again.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>because of the nature of the inspiration for this fic, there's just gonna be a lot of mbmbam references guys. that's just how it be. I came so close to naming this chapter Clown In The Shower but most talk of the Punishment Clown is actually in the next chapter so that didn't quite fit. Also, unsurprisingly I decided that this is gonna be longer than four chapters. How much longer? I don't know, but for now let's just go up by two and see how it goes. </p>
<p>as always, thanks for reading and i hope you enjoyed!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Failed Step One</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Barry ended up being about ten minutes late to work. Which wasn’t typical for him, but also wasn’t unheard of either. He was able to rush in and head to his lab without anyone giving him too much shit, and even more thankfully with no one questioning him on why he was late.</p>
<p>He didn’t <em> regret </em> it at all, absolutely not. He still wasn’t exactly adept at talking about anything like this though, and he was not good at lying.</p>
<p>Setting his stuff down on his desk, Barry would have liked to give himself a moment to rest from having run so much to get here. Usually he would be able to, even late like this. His schedule could be pretty casual, but he actually had meetings this morning. Really, despite what he said last night probably hadn’t been the best time to kind of go off the rails in the decision making department. Still didn’t regret it any.</p>
<p>But that meant having to leave there as soon as his stuff was away and run off to the meeting he was still late for. There was a definite awkward moment where a bunch of other academics and people with much more power but much less intelligence all turned and looked at him, but he just mumbled an apology and quickly sat down.</p>
<p>The meeting resumed without much note after that, and almost immediately Barry was losing interest. That was far from unusual, it happened basically every meeting. He just wanted to do his research and his programs, he didn’t have any interest in this side of things. Unfortunately, in order to keep getting funding and all that good stuff he needed to at least make pretend that he did.</p>
<p>He wasn’t making more than the most basics of attempts today though. After maybe fifteen minutes of sitting there attempting to pay attention he started poking at his phone. It was hidden well enough behind his laptop that it could almost be seen as taking notes.</p>
<p>Scrolling through his contacts, he had to suppress a smile when he paused at Lup’s. She had put a little winky face after her name, and for a moment Barry’s hand hovered over the contact.</p>
<p>He just didn’t know the protocol for this kind of situation. Sure, he <em> had </em> actually dated before. There was that short time him and Lucretia had dated in high school, before Barry realized that the strange feeling he’d been feeling for her was an exotic new thing called <em> friendship, </em> and before Lucretia had realized guys weren’t exactly her type. A few even shorter lived relationships in college, none of them ever going anywhere. Most of that had honestly been on his end, he hadn’t been <em> good </em> at people.</p>
<p>He still wouldn’t say he was good at it, but he’d gotten better. He liked to think himself less of a dick nowadays, at least.</p>
<p>Still, even if he’d had all the experience dating in the world, the fact of the matter was this wasn’t <em> that. </em> Lup had been real straightforward on that, which Barry appreciated. Sure, this sort of casual hook up thing was pretty damn far out of his comfort zone, but for once that wasn’t making him want to back off. Maybe that was just Lup, she was disarming in a way that made him want to go along with whatever she suggested.</p>
<p>So yeah, this wasn’t something he knew how to do, but he wanted to give it a try. So far, despite having literally every reason not to, it seemed to be going well. He just didn’t want to mess it up.</p>
<p>After some debate, he sent Lup a quick text.</p>
<p><em> Barry:<br/></em> <em> Hey, I just wanted to make sure you got back to your place okay. You weren’t joking about that motel being in a very questionable area. </em></p>
<p>Okay, that didn’t seem out of line. He would have wanted to check up on any friend he knew was leaving a sketchy as fuck place like that on their own, so it wasn’t weird. Or at least, he hoped it wouldn’t be seen as weird.</p>
<p>It didn’t take very long for Lup to reply, Barry taking a moment to nod and make an agreeable sound at the rest of the meeting before checking the new message.</p>
<p><em> Lup:<br/></em> <em> Oh yeah babe, we’re all good here. <br/></em> <em> It’s being home now that’s the problem. My bro’s pissed at me. He put the punishment clown in the shower when I got home :( </em></p>
<p>Barry blinked in confusion at that, trying not to let it show on his face as he quickly typed up a reply.</p>
<p><em> Barry:<br/></em> <em> Do I want to know what the punishment clown is??? </em></p>
<p><em> Lup: <br/></em> <em> It’s a big clown balloon. We both hate the fucking thing and so whoever decides to act like booboo the fool gets the clown hidden somewhere as punishment. </em></p>
<p><em> Barry: <br/></em> <em> If you both hate it have one of you ever hidden it somewhere and then scared yourself? </em></p>
<p><em> Lup: <br/></em> <em> Maybe :( </em></p>
<p>It was very hard for Barry not to laugh at that, having to cough into his hand before turning his attention back towards the meeting for a few minutes. When he finally chanced looking back down at his phone, there was another message waiting for him.</p>
<p><em> Lup: <br/></em> <em> Whatever though, he can be pissy. I have a great judge of character and you obviously weren’t a murderer, so it checks out.<br/></em> <em> Were you able to get to work okay? </em></p>
<p><em> Barry: <br/></em> <em> Oh yeah, I’m actually in a meeting right now. </em></p>
<p><em> Lup: <br/></em> <em> Oooh, not very professional there, texting during a meeting ;) </em></p>
<p><em> Barry: <br/></em> <em> they’re just lucky I showed up today. Did not have to do that. </em></p>
<p><em> Lup: <br/></em> <em> I’ll give you that one. </em></p>
<p>Barry had to force himself not to smile too noticeably as he leaned his phone back down again. He wasn’t sure how, but things actually didn’t feel all that awkward. Instead of wanting to end the conversation as soon as possible he wished he could ignore the rest of the meeting entirely and keep on talking to her.</p>
<p>That was not a great idea for several reasons though. One, he actually did like his job, so he didn’t really want to lose that. The second thing was, well…</p>
<p>It would be bad to get too attached. He told Lup that he would be fine with nothing serious, and so he was going to be fine with nothing serious. Which probably meant not hiding behind his laptop trying not to giggle as he texted her like a highschooler with a crush. They could just be friends. He <em> wanted </em> to be friends.</p>
<p>So, as much as he’d rather do anything else, Barry texted Lup letting her know that he should probably pay attention to the meeting. For her part she didn’t seem too bothered, understanding and saying they would talk more later. With that Barry actually put his phone away, forcing himself to pay attention to the other people in the room again.</p>
<p>Somehow, the meeting seemed even more boring than usual after that.</p>
<p>Once he was actually able to go back to his lab and the part of his job he actually enjoyed it wasn’t as bad. After a while he was even able to get into a roll and get his mind off of Lup for a bit, which was good. He wasn’t totally obsessed after one night, so the crush that seemed to flair up whenever he was talking to her would probably pass with time. Nothing to worry about.</p>
<p>The rest of the week ended up being pretty regular. He went to work, came home, saw Kravitz on the rare occasions where their scheduled aligned, and didn’t sleep as much as someone probably should. It would have been just like any other week in his adult life, if not for the one thing.</p>
<p>Him and Lup kept texting. It was casual, or at least Barry was pretty sure it was casual. Stupid things, like Lup sending him a picture of a stuffed bear in bluejeans she found at walmart that she insisted was him, a picture of the ‘punishment clown’ so that Barry would stop asking about it (which was indeed horrifying), the dinner she had cooked one night and wanted to show off.</p>
<p>Barry found himself responding just as stupidly, like sending her the Hungry Man he’d been halfway through eating in response to her dinner. The disgust and dismay on her end made him laugh, and he was lucky that his roommate wasn’t home.</p>
<p>He hadn’t talked to anyone about Lup yet. Partially because he didn’t exactly have a lot of people to talk to, and partially because it wasn’t anyone else’s business. He certainly didn’t see a reason to tell anyone about a hook up he had, and when it came to casually talking to her this was just for fun. He knew her brother knew, but otherwise he was pretty sure Lup hadn’t mentioned this to anyone either.</p>
<p>The start to it all had been too weird to want to try and explain it to other people, so he wasn’t going to even try. At least for now.</p>
<p>Barry was eating dinner when another text from Lup came in. They hadn’t really talked much that day, which wasn’t usual. They texted here and there, but it wasn’t a constant thing, as much as Barry always felt himself wanting to talk to her.</p>
<p><em> Lup:<br/></em> <em> Hey babe<br/></em> <em> You up? ;) </em></p>
<p><em> Barry: <br/></em> <em> It’s 7:30pm Lup </em></p>
<p><em> Lup: <br/></em> <em> The question stands </em></p>
<p><em> Barry: <br/></em> <em> Yes, I am awake. Why are you asking? </em></p>
<p>It wasn’t like Barry didn’t have an idea about why she might be asking. Sure, they hadn’t seen each other in person since that first night, but it wasn’t like they both hadn’t been obvious about wanting to see each other again. Still, he didn’t want to assume, no matter how many winky faces Lup sent.</p>
<p><em> Lup: <br/></em> <em> Because my brother is busy tonight so he can’t try to lecture me about poor life decisions <br/></em> <em> Or well, what he thinks is poor life decisions <br/></em> <em> I very much have liked the decisions I’ve made recently </em></p>
<p><em> Barry: <br/></em> <em> Oh well, in that case yes I am definitely free tonight <br/></em> <em> And so is my apartment, actually </em></p>
<p><em> Lup: <br/></em> <em> Roommate out for the night? </em></p>
<p><em> Barry: <br/></em> <em> Yeah, I was actually already thinking about inviting you over </em></p>
<p>He had been, and even though Lup had been the one to suggest it first he still felt his face heat up admitting that. From her response though it didn’t seem like she was bothered at all, quite the opposite if he was being honest.</p>
<p>Lup: <br/><em> Well then, why don’t we get this show on the road?<br/>What’s your address?</em></p>
<p>Barry sent over the information, and Lup said she’d be over in about half an hour. The apartment as a whole wasn’t a disaster area, Kravitz tended to get pissed if he let his work experiments get too out of control. Even still, Barry spent a good chunk of that time tidying up his room some, throwing laundry into the hamper and such.</p>
<p>He was trying not to be nervous. Lup somehow hadn’t been completely turned off by him yet, so he told himself a somewhat messy desk and cluttered shelves probably weren't going to be the things to do it.</p>
<p>Barry had almost managed to convince himself that he wasn’t nervous when he heard a knock on his door, which near about made him jump into the air. Taking a deep breath, he tried to get himself back under control before going and answering it.</p>
<p>It shouldn’t have surprised him that Lup was on the other side, but a part of him still had a hard time accepting that any of this was real. She was there though, and she was absolutely gorgeous. It wasn’t like she was wearing anything special, just a casual t-shirt and jeans with a light jacket, but that didn’t matter because she was simply beautiful.</p>
<p>There was a moment of nerves on her face, but they cleared up quickly as she looked at him.</p>
<p>“Oh good, right apartment,” she said, and oh, that explained the nerves. He grinned and nodded, stepping aside to let her in.</p>
<p>“Yeah, they can all sort of blend together if you’re not paying attention,” he said, shutting the door behind her. There was definitely a part of Barry that was starting to feel awkward and unsure of what to do. He hadn’t been much better off last time, but it seemed somehow compounded being in his own apartment.</p>
<p>“I’d offer you dinner, but I kind of got the impression that you’re not the biggest fan of microwavable meals?” he joked, getting a laugh out of Lup. That helped, it was better when she was laughing for a lot of reasons.</p>
<p>“Hey, I’ve eaten my fair share of shitty college meals in my time, I’m not above the microwavable meals. I’ll just mercilessly judge you for them anyway,” she said, and Barry couldn’t help but grin at that.</p>
<p>“Sounds reasonable enough,” he said, closing the distance between them. When Lup stayed right where she was grinning at him Barry tentatively put his hands on her waist, pulling her into a kiss. As she kissed him back it was hard to put into words just how breathtaking she was, how every action and movement she made felt like it had the power to pull his soul from his chest.</p>
<p>When she finally pulled away Barry really did have to take a moment to catch his breath, although she didn’t seem to be in much better condition.</p>
<p>“So, roommate gone for the night?” she asked, and Barry nodded a bit dumbly. “Cool, bedroom then?” she continued, and right. She didn’t know where his was.</p>
<p>“Yeah, uh, this way,” he said, taking her hand and leading her towards his bedroom. Even if it wasn’t perfect, he was glad that he picked up some before she came over. Despite that, he kind of forgot that some of the items he had very neatly arranged and displayed weren’t exactly average band posters or Live Laugh Love signs. So once they were in the bedroom he saw Lup start to turn back towards him, only for her to pause as her eyes caught on his shelf.</p>
<p>“Okay, quick pause cause I definitely want to get back to what we were doing before, but what is that?” she asked. Barry turned, trying to follow her eyes but not quite able to pick out exactly what she was looking at. He could still feel dread start to pile up in his gut as he looked at the many, many options of what it <em> could </em> be.</p>
<p>“Which thing?” he asked, not sure what else to say. In response Lup moved away from him, heading towards the shelf, which was covered in all sorts of odds and ends. Computers didn’t really leave a lot to display, so his other hobbies ended up here.</p>
<p>“This,” she said, and it was hard to read her voice. Their last meeting and all the conversations up until now had gone fine, but he got the feeling Lup might suddenly have to leave after this.</p>
<p>“That’s uh, that’s a formaldehyde lizard,” he said, mumbling and he was expecting her to look horrified. He wouldn’t even blame her for being horrified.</p>
<p>Instead, her eyes seemed to light up as she carefully moved the jar around to look at it from all sides.</p>
<p>“Like, a real one? Oh shit, is this a real bird?” she asked, attention quickly jumping as she let her fingers carefully brushed the taxidermy crow next to it.</p>
<p>“Yeah, my roommate actually got me that one,” he said, honestly surprised that Lup hadn’t run yet. There was a reason he didn’t have many friends, and the ones he did have either knew him long enough that this wasn’t weird, or he had to ease them into the whole… dead thing collection.</p>
<p>“<em> Oh my god are these teeth?” </em> Lup asked suddenly, and Barry could see the dice in her hands. He hadn't realized she'd been looking at them until she shouted, but it wasn't out of fear. No, she sounded <em> delighted. </em></p>
<p>“Right, those. Yeah, they’re actual human teeth. I actually won those in an art auction. There was this whole challenge on who could use teeth in art, it was weird,” he explained, starting to feel less nervous. Somehow she wasn't turning and running. No, she seemed mesmerized by them for a moment, and Barry could feel his heart beating as he watched her. Lup very carefully rolled the dice on his dresser before putting them back into their container.</p>
<p>“That’s horrifying, I can’t <em> believe </em> I missed the teeth auction!” she said, and it was a joke but he got the feeling that she would have genuinely wanted to go had she known.</p>
<p>“So, just checking, you’re not creeped out by all of this? Because I’ll be honest I completely forgot about that shelf and it’s probably not the most welcoming sight,” he asked. Lup scoffed, placing his teeth dice back before turning towards him again.</p>
<p>“Oh hell no, I’m into it,” she insisted, pulling him into another kiss as if to prove her point. Barry didn’t resist, kissing back and guiding them over to the bed. As the kiss deepened and turned more and more passionate, Barry couldn’t quite get rid of a small nag in the back of his head.</p>
<p>There was only one thing he needed to do to keep from fucking this all up.</p>
<p>Step One: he could not fall in love with Lup.</p>
<p>He was pretty sure he had already failed step one. </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>unsurprisingly, they're bad at this. more fun for me tho. also, camp nano starts tomorrow, and while i'm going to try (oh lord to I try) to focus on an original idea for the majority of camp it's also gonna be a chance for me to try and work more consistently on my fics, so hopefully i'll be getting a chapter out of this at least once a week from now on, we'll see. </p>
<p>as always, thanks for reading and i hope you enjoyed!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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